


Guard me an Angel

by TottWriter



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angels, Haikyuu!! Fantasy Exchange 2019, I promise, M/M, Reincarnation AU, listen this is NOT angsty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-20 17:37:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21285560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TottWriter/pseuds/TottWriter
Summary: Suga is an angel in training. He'd probably be a full angel already, except for the mysterious and handsome stranger who keeps accidentally killing him each time he reincarnates. It's honestly getting to be something of a joke.But the cycle can't last forever. Sooner or later he'sgotto make it through a lifetime without their apparently perpetually fatal paths crossing....And that's exactly the outcome he's hoping for. Right?
Relationships: Sawamura Daichi/Sugawara Koushi
Comments: 4
Kudos: 100





	Guard me an Angel

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SaintImperator](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SaintImperator/gifts).

> This story was written for the 2019 Haikyuu!! Fantasy Exchange. I'm sorry it's run a little late, but I got there in the end!

_ We can’t keep meeting like this, _ Suga thinks, wincing as he gets to his feet. Surely there are only so many times fate can intervene. One of these days their luck—if that’s what you can really call it—is going to run out. He’s going to grow old. Going to meet someone else along the way. Going to…going to stop bumping into the handsome stranger who touches his lives so fleetingly and yet so profoundly. 

It’s not that that would be a  _ bad  _ thing, as such. In all honesty, it would probably mean a promotion from the constant reincarnation cycle he’s been stuck in for so long, looping round and round the world until he can make a meaningful change for enough people. Lord knows he’d probably have done better at that job if he didn’t keep getting booted back to heaven shortly after every encounter he’s had with his mysterious and apparently accidental nemesis. 

Really, that’s something of an intriguing notion all of its own. Reincarnation is no simple matter. The chance of even one repeat encounter with someone is almost astronomical, let alone the dozen or so unfortunately terminal encounters he’s had with the guy so far. If he didn’t know better, he’d suspect he was doing it on purpose. 

Unfortunately he  _ does  _ know better, which is a comfort—the thought of that handsome face plotting something so sinister leaves an uncomfortable twist in his gut—but also incredibly frustrating. Dumb luck. It’s all dumb luck or rather, dumb  _ bad  _ luck, which is even worse. 

It’s irritating enough that he doesn’t even feel rested in his rooms, which are specifically  _ engineered  _ to help him rest and recover after another bout on Earth. Living—and then of course dying—is a stress on the soul, and it’s important to decompress and re-centre himself before thinking about another attempt at earning his wings.

In truth, Suga can’t help but wonder if he might benefit from a slightly longer break this time. He’s not getting anywhere; barely able to help a handful of people before his body’s time is cut short. At this rate he’s going to earn a reputation or something. 

Realistically, he ought to try and break the cycle somehow…but if he’s honest with himself, a large part of him doesn’t even particularly want to. It’s not exactly fun having the highest Life Count out of his entire his graduating class, or to watch his former classmates gain their wings and move on to more interesting work, but at the same time…

At the same time, there’s something weirdly engaging about Mr. Handsome Stranger which makes him want to just pick himself up and try again. Something quite aside from the fact that Suga wants his wings, and he wants to help people. Almost as much as any of that, he’d also quite like to know the  _ name  _ of the person who keeps inadvertently killing him. 

And wow, isn’t that a ridiculous thought to have. He can acknowledge as much even as the curiosity nags at him, unending. A sort of unfinished business which hangs around. Except instead of it being leftover from his most recent life the way usual regrets are, it’s left over from  _ all  _ of them. Instead of diminishing with time and experience, the feeling only grows.

* * *

There’s an important rule about reincarnation and it is this: Angels don’t really remember too much about themselves while they’re on Earth. All that surrounding human-ness gets in the way a little, and it would be rather inconvenient to experience so many childhoods in full awareness of every life you’ve led before. 

Memories creep in here and there, as an angel grows into adulthood, but it’s usually more a case of instincts than certainties. Deja vu which strikes a little too often, or a tendency towards beginners luck. Nothing outrageous, nothing to make humans suspect that higher beings walk amongst them. Just odd hunches here and there, and a lingering sense of purpose to guide them in their work.

For this reason, it’s vanishingly rare for an angel to gain their wings without experiencing a few lifetimes first. It’s hard to complete a task you don’t know about, after all. And yet, at the same time, the test is one of character, not skill. So while there’s no overt stigma to failure, no penalty to a life lived without accomplishing some part of their goal…past a certain point the cycle can begin to feel like judgement.

Daichi does his best not to feel judged. It’s not as though he’s ever spent his lives being  _ selfish  _ as such. He hasn’t squandered his opportunities, or behaved inappropriately. He can look back on each of his human lifetimes with something akin to pride. He’s done his best. He’s  _ tried _ . The worst of his mistakes were things anyone could have done, and that’s something his friends reassure him of as well, whenever their downtime overlaps. 

All the same, he’s tired. Tired of the endless monotony of rebirth, tired of feeling powerless to make meaningful change in the world the way some of his former classmates are now able to. 

Mostly—and somewhat guiltily—though, he’s tired of his constant near-misses with the mysterious, fascinating, and yet apparently  _ cursed  _ man who keeps accidentally killing him. 

* * *

Suga has always been considered…lucky. Not in a particularly  _ unusual  _ way or anything, but on a mundane level he’s definitely one of life’s more fortunate individuals. 

He’s bright: academic in a way that could have made him lazy but hasn’t. Tests are minor inconveniences, lessons and homework easily completed to high standards no matter what. It might have made him something of a nerd to half his classmates, but he’s athletic too: lean and muscular from years of sport.

Insofar as such things  _ can  _ be judged, Suga is fully prepared to accept that this makes him fortunate. His path through school was greatly eased by his academic ability, and gainful employment an obvious end result. By the time he’s in his early twenties he has a steady—if uninteresting—job, and a good circle of friends to keep him company in his time off. 

It’s a good life by any definition, one which grants him the freedom to travel and experience the world to its fullest. But there’s something  _ missing _ , he’s sure of it, even if he can never quite put his finger on what. 

Suga finds himself stewing on the problem as he stands on the train home from work one day, watching the world roll by to the gentle hum and rattle of the train’s passage. The other inhabitants of the carriage sway in time with each bump and corner. Perfectly synchronised.

There’s no real  _ reason  _ for him to feel unsatisfied in the way he does. He has a good relationship with his family, and spends his holiday each year travelling somewhere new, or on self-improvement. Every time that feeling of dissatisfaction crops up, he tries to channel it into something positive, rather than risk stewing on it. Over the years he’s given a considerable amount of both time and money to worthy causes, but it’s as if his actions are pointless.

In fact, perversely, the more his family and friends remark upon his good qualities, the more he can’t help but feel as if he’s doing something wrong. This is…it’s all  _ meaningless _ . It’s pointless. He’s spent far too long now just going through the same motions, hoping that it will turn into something greater. Hoping—

_ —Wait, what?  _

The sudden jumble of feelings catches him off-guard. It’s…where did that even  _ come  _ from? The thought feels familiar and yet strange, as though he’s had it before. But he can’t ever remember a point in his life where he’d felt so overwrought with frustration about something like this. Logically it doesn’t make sense.

But maybe that’s the whole problem. Maybe that’s what’s wrong?  _ Logically  _ his life is great. On paper he has everything a young professional could look for. Well, except perhaps a doting wife, but he’s rather too gay for a doting wife, so that’s an expectation he’d let go of from a very young age. ‘Lifelong bachelor’ isn’t too terrible a fate, and he’s pretty sure it’s not  _ that  _ which has gotten him so worked up.

Probably. Almost definitely. 

In any case he feel restless now the thought has occurred. Restless and strangely impatient, as though he has to do something about this problem  _ now _ . As though the clock’s ticking on, and by implication time is running out. 

There are three stops to go until Suga’s station, but when the train pulls up next he finds himself pushing past the other assorted salarymen and practically running along the platform to the exit. The need to do something now now  _ now  _ is almost overwhelming. To throw aside his happy but sedentary life and channel his frustration into something  _ bigger _ . Something more important than checking spreadsheets and hosting weekly profit meetings for other bored office workers trying to look passionate about business.

Maybe he should travel the world. Throw away anything which doesn’t fit into a backpack and tour everything. Sell his house and his bike—no, keep the bike and cycle everywhere. Down with office work, down with the daily commute. He can do so much more than this. Make so much more of a difference somehow if he’s not shackled to an office each day. 

He can get so lost in his thoughts as he wanders the streets of a town he’s never visited before that he bumps right into a stranger on the corner of a city block, and almost— _ almost _ —send them both tumbling into the path of a truck. 

“Shit!” he cries, clutching his chest as they both stumble back from the edge of the road. The truck’s horn blasts its driver’s irritation with them as it barrels past and out of sight.

“Shit, I am  _ so  _ sorry about that— ” he goes on, but the stranger is apologising in a low, pleasant baritone even as he trips over his words: 

“Wow, are you okay? I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

They both come to a halt almost at the same time, staring at each other in surprise. And it  _ is  _ surprise, because Suga is damn sure he’s never met this man before in his life, and yet—

“—Do I know you?” the man asks, and wow, if that doesn’t just compound the weirdness. 

He shakes his head slowly. “No, but…”

The man grins and shakes his head, before rubbing at the back of it with one hand. “Yeah, yeah, no, sorry. I don’t even live here, so that’s a pretty ridiculous thing for me to ask. And I really am sorry for bumping into you like that. I’m not normally this careless, I promise. I blame it on a strange day. A  _ really  _ strange day.”

Suga grins. “Honestly I thought it was my fault,” he says, shrugging. “I wasn’t really paying attention.” He’s staring as he speaks, and he  _ knows  _ that really he ought to just move on and let this poor man do the same, but there’s just…there’s  _ something  _ about him which has Suga’s feet locked in place. He can’t explain it, can’t explain why he’s so weirdly sure that this man looks familiar.

“Hey, so, this is probably an odd question, but…uh…what’s your name?”

**Author's Note:**

> Meanwhile, up in heaven, some other angel is _incredibly_ relieved right about now. Only took like, twenty tries...


End file.
